Law and Order 101

Pope Benedict has always been a superb teacher. Read any of his writings, listen to any of his addresses, and you’ll find basic truths delivered with captivating art and grace. 

He’s addressing the world soon with a message so fundamental, everyone already knows it, whether they realize it or not. And it’s my favorite.

It is the natural law imprinted by God upon the heart of every man, Benedict XVI writes in his message. Those who desire peace must also defend the right to life and to religious freedom.

It doesn’t get any more basic than that.

As he does every year, on the feast day of the Immaculate Conception the pope signed the message for the World Day of Peace, which will be celebrated next January 1st.

The message for the New Year of 2007 is the fortieth in its series, inaugurated by Paul VI in 1968.

Sandro Magister has the full text of Benedict’s message on Chiesa, at the above link.

Benedict XVI begins with a truth he previously affirmed in Regensburg: “We believe that at the beginning of everything is the eternal Word, reason and not unreason”.

In the conscience of every man, God has inscribed a natural law that “represents the foundation for a dialogue between the followers of the different religions and between believers and non-believers.”

For Benedict XVI, this is the “grammar” of peace.

This also establishes the right to life and to religious freedom:

“As far as the right to life is concerned – the pope writes – we must denounce its widespread violation in our society: alongside the victims of armed conflicts, terrorism and the different forms of violence, there are the silent deaths caused by hunger, abortion, experimentation on human embryos and euthanasia.”

As for religious freedom, Benedict XVI recalls not only the violent persecutions, but also the “systematic cultural denigration of religious beliefs.”

Further on, the pope denounces the “persistent inequalities between men and women in the exercise of basic human rights.”

Benedict XVI continues by saying that threats to peace are presented by “conceptions of God” that justify violence, and also a relativistic vision of man, according to which human rights are changeable and are “constantly negotiable rights, with regard to content, time and place.”

The final part of the message touches on the question of terrorism and war, with a reference to the recent conflict in Lebanon, “where the duty to protect and help innocent victim and to avoid involving the civilian population was largely ignored.”

That pretty much covers the issues of the world, and in a language that is universal – the “grammar of peace” that everyone already knows because the natural law is “written on the human heart.”

It’s what you can’t not know.

So this will be a refresher course.